The file was thicker than it looked.
Dozens of classified pages, encrypted blueprints, and genetic schematics sprawled before them—Alethea's origin wasn't just an accident. It was a program.
A prototype.
Seraphim wasn't a codename.
It was her.
Lucien was the first to speak. "So they engineered you?"
Alethea stared at the page that outlined her DNA structure. "No. They crafted me. Every skill. Every neural enhancement. Every instinct to survive... was manufactured."
Marco's jaw clenched. "You said your memories were real."
"They are," she said. "But they were implanted after I passed the trials. My life started in a lab."
A silence thick as night fell in the room.
Marco leaned forward. "What was the purpose of Project Seraphim?"
Alethea flipped to the last page.
"To create a being who could outthink, outfight, and outlast every leader, assassin, and strategist in the world. One who would be irresistible to power… and capable of overthrowing it."
Lucien let out a low whistle. "That's you, alright."
But she wasn't smiling.
Because beneath the page, there was a newer file—sealed with a crimson stamp: Active Subject 02.
And under that, a name.
"MONARCH."
---
They traced Monarch to a covert blacksite in Montenegro—a former weapons facility turned into a fortress cloaked in quantum camouflage.
Lucien, Marco, and Alethea boarded the Falcon jet before sunrise.
As the jet cut through clouds, Marco sat beside her, voice low. "You think Monarch is your clone?"
"Not just that," she whispered. "They perfected what I failed to be."
Lucien, across from them, loaded his pistol. "Then we kill it."
Alethea looked at him.
"No," she said. "We save it. Because if they engineered Monarch from me… she might still think she's human."
---
The facility was a ghost town—silent, dark, and reeking of rot.
Marco led. Lucien flanked left. Alethea moved through the shadows like a whisper.
They reached the containment lab.
Inside, floating in stasis—was a girl.
Not older than sixteen.
Same eyes. Same face.
But empty.
No soul in them.
Alethea stepped forward, breath catching. "She's…"
"Beautiful," Marco muttered.
"No," Alethea corrected, her voice hollow. "She's dead inside."
Suddenly, alarms screamed.
The facility roared to life.
And the stasis tank burst open.
---
The girl landed silently.
Eyes locking onto Alethea's. No emotion. No hesitation.
Lucien raised his gun, but Alethea stopped him.
"Let me talk to her."
She stepped forward slowly. "What's your name?"
The girl blinked. Voice mechanical. "Designation: MONARCH."
"You're more than that," Alethea said softly. "You're like me."
"I am better."
She launched forward.
Faster than a bullet.
Alethea barely blocked the strike. The room exploded into chaos. Steel clashed, glass shattered, and Marco fired shot after shot, only for Monarch to dodge like liquid shadow.
Lucien screamed. "We can't beat her!"
But Alethea wasn't trying to beat her.
She was trying to reach her.
Pinned to the ground, she gasped, "They made you believe you're a weapon. But you feel it, don't you? That voice inside? That ache to choose something of your own?"
Monarch's fist trembled above her face.
"Choose now," Alethea whispered. "Be more than what they created."
Silence.
Then… Monarch screamed—a sound not mechanical, but human.
She collapsed.
And the system shut down.
---
Back on the jet, Monarch lay sedated.
Lucien patched his bleeding arm. "What now?"
Marco turned to Alethea. "You okay?"
She nodded. "For now."
Then looked out the window as the sunrise crept over the horizon.
"They made me to be a queen in a world of puppets. Now…"
She looked at Monarch, then back to the sky.
"I'll burn the throne and build my own empire."
The jet touched down in Zurich under the veil of dusk.
They brought Monarch—now sedated and stabilized—into a private bunker owned by one of Marco's shell corporations. For the first time, Alethea wasn't the only anomaly in the room.
Lucien stared at the girl sleeping behind glass. "She hasn't moved in hours."
"She's healing," Alethea replied. "Her system's in shutdown after override."
Marco stood behind her, arms crossed, tension in every line of his body. "And if she wakes up hostile?"
"She won't," Alethea answered firmly. "She's not just code. She hesitated. That means she can choose."
Lucien leaned back. "I hope you're right, because if not, we've just brought a ticking time bomb into the only safe house left."
Alethea's expression darkened. "This place isn't safe either."
Marco turned to her. "Why?"
She lifted her wrist comm and replayed a scrambled audio loop.
"Subject 01 breached perimeter. Monarch failed. Reset protocol initiated. Code: Edenfall."
Lucien frowned. "What the hell is Edenfall?"
Alethea whispered, "It's not a protocol. It's a purge."
Just then, the power flickered.
Then darkness.
Then red.
Emergency lighting.
And a single word blinking across the screens:
"WELCOME TO EDENFALL."
---
The floor vibrated.
Gas hissed through hidden vents.
Alethea grabbed Lucien's mask and shoved it on him before snapping her own into place.
Marco growled, "They knew we'd come here."
"They planted us here," she spat. "They let us take Monarch so she could lead them back to me."
Lucien clutched a control panel. "We're locked in."
"No, we're not," Alethea muttered. She moved to the center console and started typing with fluid speed.
Marco leaned over. "What are you doing?"
"Rerouting oxygen feeds to the incinerator system," she said.
"You'll blow the whole facility," Lucien warned.
"Exactly."
She hit enter.
A tremor rocked the bunker.
Sirens blared.
"RUNNN!" Alethea shouted.
They bolted through the hallway, smoke swirling behind them, fire licking the edges of the collapsing infrastructure.
Marco grabbed her wrist. "Elevator's dead!"
"Maintenance shaft," Alethea gasped. "This way—"
They dove inside the narrow space just as the bunker erupted into flame.
---
Outside, panting, burned, alive—they collapsed beside a black SUV Lucien hotwired in less than thirty seconds.
As the facility burned behind them, Alethea looked at Monarch, now awake in the back seat.
"I know you were programmed to betray me," she said calmly.
Monarch didn't deny it.
"But you didn't. Why?"
Monarch blinked. "Because… for the first time… someone called me human."
Alethea felt her chest tighten.
Marco's hand found hers in the shadows.
But before peace could settle, Lucien's phone rang.
He answered—then paled.
"Say that again?" he barked into the speaker.
Pause.
He turned to them.
"Someone breached Marco's HQ in Geneva. They're leaking files."
Marco narrowed his eyes. "What kind of files?"
Lucien hesitated.
"About you, Alethea."
She stilled. "What files?"
Lucien's voice was grim.
"Everything. Your enhancements. Your real past. The murders. The lab. The Seraphim Project."
Alethea's blood ran cold.
"Who?"
Lucien looked up slowly.
"The one person who had access."
Marco's jaw clenched.
Alethea whispered it before anyone else could.
"Adrienne."
TBC..................